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How to identify a yam daisy (microseris scapigera)

3/8/2017

 
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**Note: this blog has been recently updated with what I believe to be the correct Latin name for the subspecies of yam daisy we have been growing - microseris scapigera (not microseris lanceolata). This is the alpine form of the plant and likely to be the species naturally growing in Namadgi, where the original seeds had apparently been collected. The confusion arose due to the original plants we bought being labelled as microseris lanceolata, which I have since learned is actually a larger sized and less palatable plant.**

When Europeans first arrived in the Canberra area, it was said that the open hillsides glowed yellow with yam daisy flowers - a delicious indigenous staple food. This little yellow flowered plant looks remarkably similar to a dandelion, but up close it is quite different.

Sadly today yam daisies are quite hard to find. Decades of sheep grazing has almost eradicated this plant from its former habitats. The yellow flowers you see around the suburbs, and increasingly in our national parks, are usually exotic dandelions and cat's ears.

So next time you're walking through the bush and you come across a yellow flower, how can you tell if it's really a yam daisy?

In this post I'll show you how.

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Planting up our berms with perennial plant guilds

4/7/2017

 
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Permaculture is about growing plants together in beneficial combinations - where the characteristics of one plant benefit another, and vice versa. A simple idea is to ensure you have habitat for pollinating insects (e.g. lots of different flowering plants) so you can be sure there are lots of the right kinds of insects around to pollinate your fruit trees when they come into flower too. Another is to use ground covers that don't directly compete with your trees and shrubs, but instead act as a barrier to weeds and grasses especially, which can compete for nutrients in the same soil layer with establishing produce trees.

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Growing perennial leeks in Canberra

7/4/2017

 
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The leek we're all familiar with that you can readily buy in the shops is an annual plant, meaning that new seeds need to be grown every year to grow new leeks.

But did you know that leeks have a perennial cousin?

The perennial leek is a variant of allium ampeloprasum - the other being elephant garlic. I didn't know about it either, until I happened upon a market stall on the south coast, about 2 years ago, where someone was selling a few tiny leeks in a pot. So I bought the pot and took them back, and now, a few seasons on, it's taking off! From that tiny punnet, we now have a whole bed of them! What's more - they're delicious!


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The indestructable Jerusalem artichoke

5/6/2012

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If ever there was a plant that can make you feel like you're the greatest gardener, it has to be the Jerusalem artichoke. Give them a little water, forget about them, and then after their cheery yellow blooms fall (they're a relative of the sunflower) and the plant dies down for winter, there's a secret haul of sweet knobbly tubers just below the surface.



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